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Tag: Worldview

Nearly every day we are exposed to things that are just not real. How much of the information that we are presented with is factually based?

One of the best examples of this is a general belief that only people subscribing to an organized faith are religious and that all things secular are non-religious.

I have a problem with this view because I know many people of faith who are non-religious and I also know a number of people who are very religious about their secular worldview! In fact, I observe a far greater zeal in proselytizing the secular perspective than any other worldview!

We all share a common human characteristic. We all believe ourselves to be right, and anyone disagreeing with us to be obviously wrong.

Therefore to debate rights and wrongs is pretty much a waste of time unless we can understand that everyone’s perception of what is right or wrong is based on their personal worldview, developed through all that they have experienced in life.

It is also critical to acknowledge two important things about world views that apply to everyone. We must understand that since perfection eludes us all, everyone’s worldview is corrupted to one degree or another.

Of even greater importance, we must be willing to acknowledge the possibility of being wrong respecting our worldview position and be desirous of correcting error in a quest to know the truth.

This is why we do not hesitate to publicly declare our Christian world view. Since every decision and direction taken is based on an assumption of truth, our desire to help others will obviously be based on our perspective of that truth.

Since our worldview influences how we see things in the world, I want to quickly summarize our beliefs about education.

Obviously, we believe in a loving God who is the creator of all things, specifically the children we are training and teaching. We also maintain that this loving omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent God is consistently the same irrespective of time or place. We, therefore, advance and conduct our affairs having a greater trust in God than confidence in man.

As an organization, Education Unlimited believes that:

– Every child is created special. We do not believe any child is an accident or defective, but uniquely different.

– Differences include a host of characteristics that uniquely qualify nearly all children to excel at something in life.

– Learning is an intrinsic human function, with varying capacities being bestowed to every individual person.

– Parents are not required to create something of these created beings, but to develop what has been created towards a future they are likely to know little about.

Just as we do not see one student as superior to another, we also do not believe any career to be superior to another. We simply maintain that to whom more has been given is more expected and that differing careers require differing levels of responsibility.

Our expectation is one of excellence relative to abilities without seeking perfection.

Success is not measured by anything other than the enjoyment of doing what is being done, or more specifically, what is in keeping with the gifts and talents of the child and how they are being applied to serve God and man.

Post-secondary institutions, while needed in the pursuit of some careers, are not required for others. We also believe that institutions of higher learning should be treated as businesses from which students should expect a service.

Women can aspire to any career including, and without diminishing the importance of, being a wife and mother.

Education Unlimited also maintains:

– Freedom as a birthright that can be exchanged for rights conferred by man which are also susceptible to his revocation.

– Parents have a right but also a God-given responsibility to train and teach their children in keeping with their faith (whatever that may be, including the secular faith).

– Parents have the right NOT to “do” school either at school or at home. They also have the right to “un-school”.

Home education provides freedom from what others want us to do and believe, leaving parents in control.

Furthermore:

We trust parents to do what is best for their children and we are there to help them train and teach their children.

We guarantee that when the least amount of money is accepted, the maximum amount of educational freedom is available.

We also offer minimum paperwork, no guilt and no undue stress. We’re not interested in “busy work” for ourselves or for you. We can all fulfill our obligations without making things complicated.

We are making a difference in advocating and demonstrating educational success without the need for credits and diplomas.

We have made a difference in defining a distinction between home education and home schooling.

We have long been advocates for the admission of unaccredited students into post-secondary institutions in Alberta and across the nation.

We have a website listing all of Alberta’s post-secondary institutions and their admissions policies for home educated students. Institutions from other parts of Canada are increasingly requesting to be included on this website as well.

AND Education Unlimited is uniquely advanced in using modern technology benefiting all players in a home education.

(A wise man once said) When we’ve chosen to take a different path, we must be prepared to do things differently, and be willing to come into conflict with those who would have us do otherwise.

Think about this. What happens when you decide to do something different? Do people encourage you? Not really. Some may be challenged by your choice while others may actually be threatened by it, but few will applaud it.

The path that you’ve taken as a home educator is a decision to do something different and with that comes the challenges and conflicts of those who would prefer that you do like everybody else.

What is it that makes people react, sometimes violently when someone challenges their position on a matter? To answer that question we need to consider the root cause or foundational premise that directs the actions of people. That brings us to the importance of world view.

World view is defined as what is unquestionably assumed to be true, about oneself, and the world around us. (repeat)

The whole idea of world view actually is the world’s replacement for a word that the “worldly” don’t like to use and that word is “faith.”

So, instead of asking what faith do you belong to, we sort of make it more generic and downplay its meaning, I guess, by saying it is a world view rather than a faith.

Faith is defined as a strongly held belief or theory and world view as what is unquestionably assumed to be true about oneself and the world around us.

There is not much difference in those two definitions and we can see that they are connected as faith is the foundation of world view. Quite frankly, they are the same because both are established on our perception of God.

Everybody has a world view or faith foundation. One of the greatest tricks of the world is to say, “I’m not religious.” I have never, in my entire life, met a person who wasn’t religious, for the simple reason that there is not a person on earth that does not have a world view or faith system.

If you’ve lived, you’ve experienced things, you’ve heard things, you’ve been told things, you’ve read things, everything that you’ve been exposed to has been part of what formulated your world view.

Whether right or wrong, true or false, reality or otherwise, everyone has a world view based on all our personal experiences, whether we are aware of it or not.

Some people can actually point at it and give it a name. Other people don’t know that they have one but indeed they do and it’s based on our perception of God.

Now, speaking of education, how many people have actually been home educated? Very few, I venture to guess. Most of us are actually doing something that we have never experienced ourselves as students.

It’s like telling our children to do something that we’ve never done. A bit of a challenge, to be sure as it must begin with our correcting the errors in our worldview.

So really, when we stop to think of it, what do you think is going to happen when someone starts talking to you as a home educator and asks, what experience have you had with education?

Nearly all of us have been to school. So what do we bring with us? What’s our world view in regards to education? It is probably what we’ve experienced which is, school.

So what do 99.9 percent of the people do when they first start home educating? Bring the school home, because that’s all we’ve experienced, that’s our world view. We’re comfortable there, because that’s what we’ve come to believe is true.

I want to challenge your world view as it relates to education. It’s important, because your world view becomes the foundation of every decision that you’re ever going to make in your life, including all the decisions you will make regarding the education of your children.

It’s important because you want to make the best decisions and your making that decision is going to be based upon what you believe to be true.

I find it’s almost impossible for me to start any session on any topic without first talking about world view. It is that important. Debates that we may have, usually boil down to an expression of faith or our strongly held belief or theory in a matter.

Where are we placing our faith? Where is our world view? Since our world view and faith is the foundation for our intellectual and spiritual being, it becomes the bias.

As a matter of fact, you can see this throughout the world. The Jewish people believe that their world view is the correct one, everyone else falls under the category of gentile. The Muslim people figure that their world view is the correct one and everyone else falls under the category of infidel.

The Christian world view also believes that it’s the right one (and I happen to believe that it actually is the right one) and everyone else falls in the “other category” we refer to generally as unbelievers. All these are faith categories and therefore, all are world views.

So, whether Christian, Jewish, Muslim or any other religion, all world views really have two perspectives; one in keeping with what one believes and another which is what everybody else believes or anything that does not agree with what we believe. This creates an environment of us versus them.

If you think about this, it is the reason for every war that has ever been fought. Both sides see the other side as “the other guys” who don’t but should believe as they do and they are willing to fight over it, whether with words or with actions.

Part of the series Hangups
Written by Léo Gaumont, published on 2015-12-14.

Do we question what we believe?

We are generally all ignorant of what is actually happening around us. This ignorance can either be perpetuated and capitalized upon or fixed to empower the masses. It is time to enlighten home educators who have generally been kept in the dark respecting what is occurring within their community. (Ephesians 4: 11-16)

It is now time to review and summarize the hangups we all seem to be burdened with. To be abundantly clear, all that we are is a combination of what we have experienced and how we have allowed it to affect us. If we are actively putting the pieces of our lives together, we will carefully consider what goes into our beings, but if we are just “floating” around like on a breeze and passively allowing ourselves to be programmed, we will end up being what somebody else wants us to be. World view is formed by what we consent to and if we are not vigilant, by what we do not consent to, as well. It is a matter of being in control of our lives or of allowing some other agency to be.

Should man’s system, a system that openly opposes Jesus and His teachings, in fact, more likely all things pertaining to God and truth, be the standard by which we conduct our lives? Even a thorough cleansing of this system can at best become a cleaner version of error, which remains error! A “Christianized” version of a secular world view, or the secularization of a “Christian” world view, created through the consistent normalization of errors is no better than an unabashed anti-Christian world view. The environment that we live in puts us first and God second and as a consequence, our modern western conception of God’s redemption can be more a matter of our own creative genius than a wholesome understanding of who Jesus is and what He has done for us. This clouds our understanding of everything else.

As our western culture becomes more biblically illiterate, more secular and more focussed on self, we become more dependent on “ourselves” for answers. We hear statements like, “Is this legal?” or, “What does the government say?” or, “What are we supposed to do?”, but are we asking ourselves what it really means to lead, or are we even seeking to lead, a Christ-centred life? When I hear “I am a Christian, you know”, I have to admit that I become wary. Why should one feel a need to say so? Should it not be obvious by the life being led? Honestly, with what is being offered as “Christian” today, it is not hard to understand why the world has developed such a bad attitude about faith in Christ! We need to remind ourselves that our job as faithful followers of Christ is to individually assure that we are good ambassadors for Christ so we can collectively reflect His true character.

How does our life affect those around us? Are we living in such a way that others want what we have, or are we no different from those who have a limited, temporal understanding of reality? Worse still, are we turning people off with our misunderstandings and religious nonsense? These last few months provided me with an opportunity to get a really good look at what is being advanced as Christian education today. It was very disheartening to see just how secular, “Christian” education has become. This did not come about overnight, but through incremental compromising as schools succumbed to the temptation to give government control over the training and teaching of the children God created. We seem to have lost our focus. Even though it is parents who give birth to children by a power given them by God, and even though we pay lip service to “training them up in the way that they should go” it is no longer God’s way that is being followed, but man’s; and the very children who we should be striving to train and teach have become the currency that drives the system. This is based in fear, not faith and can legitimately be questioned as to how this can be “Christian”.

We need to ask ourselves a few questions to determine where our thinking respecting education is. Do we truly question what we have come to traditionally and culturally accept as the truth about school? Do we realize just how indoctrinated, directed and fearful we are of something that is, in essence, disconnected from the truth about education? Do we know that we have had our world view programmed with secular nonsense about children, how they learn and what awaits them in the their futures? Basing our understanding on what we have experienced, we believe we are expressing the truth about these things, and we may not even know that we are unwittingly advancing the problem as part of the solution.

Part of the series Hangups
Written by Léo Gaumont, published on 2015-11-23.

We reduce our ability to learn about the truth when we put our traditions first.

We are generally all ignorant of what is actually happening around us. This ignorance can either be perpetuated and capitalized upon or fixed to empower the masses. It is time to enlighten home educators who have generally been kept in the dark respecting what is occurring within their community. (Ephesians 4: 11-16)

Although world view is developed individually, it is largely identified in groupings of “like-minded” people who believe more or less the same thing. Since world view is built on a foundation of an understanding of God, whatever that may be, world views are generally grouped according to “religious” affiliations. These groupings can be very large: as in Eastern vs Western and First World vs Third World; or it can be divisions based on beliefs such as Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Buddhism and Hinduism; or derivatives from a particular group such as Catholic, Protestant, Jehovah’s Witnesses and Mormon; or even smaller groupings within a particular derivative such as the various denominations of Protestantism. Whatever the grouping, it is dependent on a collective world view about “deity” and its resultant application in life.

The fact that we naturally see ourselves as the centre of the universe and therefore correct in our thinking, because we say so, leads us to naturally gather with those of like mind. As we continue within this grouping, we often forget what the impetus for joining or forming the group was. That is, we start doing things because that is the way it has always been done and not necessarily because we have a definitive purpose in doing it. Tradition is what we do as a group in spite of what is written. Tradition is naturally dogmatic, in that it represents principles or sets of principles laid down by some authority as incontrovertibly true. Dissecting this further, dogma is something, or someone in authority or acting as though they are in authority, telling us what is true, whether or not it is, in fact, true… and it is something we are not to question. Combining the fact that we are told not to question something someone has told us is true, with the natural tendency to avoid being wrong at all costs, you can clearly see how Jesus could state that the word of God could be nullified through our traditions.

Once tradition is set, it slowly becomes culture when handed down from one generation to the next. If tradition is hard to change, culture is nearly impossible to change. It is fixed, whether founded on truth, error or things not important. It is because it is, and not much is going to change that.

Tradition and culture are fine. Indeed, we all enjoy living with tradition and we don’t even question the culture we are part of. Our language, dress and food is what makes us unique and interesting to say the least. However, as much as we can celebrate tradition and culture, it is even better if we know why we believe or do the things we do.

As we are likely to behave in keeping with what we have acquired, whether world view, tradition or culture and since we naturally default to being right, advancing anything that questions what we believe, or think, or do, is usually seen as an assault, attack or “act of war”. We become so certain that we are right that we become “religious” about our understanding. Whether based on facts or opinions, we gravitate to those who agree with our position, often looking to them for support in defence of what we deem to be right.

Secular education has slowly crept in and replaced what used to be largely based on biblical principles. Things advanced as sinful a few generations ago, are now advanced, not only as acceptable but worthy of celebration and it is now “sinful” to suggest that what used to be sin is still sin. Modern secular education system has tapped into the understanding that whatever we are exposed to can become part of our world view and when repeated everywhere can infuse our tradition which eventually morphs as part of our culture over time. Our Christian traditions have been under attack since their inceptions and as a consequence, our western Christian culture has become very secular. Try questioning anybody about anything respecting education and you will see that the majority will see you as an enemy. Question “Christian” education and you are likely to be seen as a heretic. Recommend a return to biblical training and teaching and you are likely to be seen as a lunatic lacking respect for our “tradition” and “culture”. Jesus tried it!

Part of the series Hangups
Written by Léo Gaumont, published on 2015-11-09.

Directing and exploiting world views is usually not in the best interest of the person being manipulated.

We are generally all ignorant of what is actually happening around us. This ignorance can either be perpetuated and capitalized upon or fixed to empower the masses. It is time to enlighten home educators who have generally been kept in the dark respecting what is occurring within their community. (Ephesians 4: 11-16)

Last week, I described world view: that everyone has one; why everybody’s world view is corrupt; and how we defend what we believe to be true. This week I want to show how our world view can be directed and/or exploited.

Those who would desire to control people have long understood the importance and power of world view development and how we become the collection of things we experience. Read or listen to the news with a critical mind and you will quickly see how information can be presented to direct or influence the world view of the readers or listeners. People naturally assume that what is being presented or experienced is, in fact, true. All human institutions, including not only the media, but academia, government, schools, even some modern day churches can be quite adept at “programming” the world view of it’s adherents.

To direct the formation of a world view, all one has to do is to carefully present one side of an issue, throw in a bit of negative information for the opposing view and people will usually come to believe the information without questioning it. Whether the intent or the information is good or bad, deliberately programming people’s world view, using either guilt or threats, is nothing short of brainwashing. This is quite easy to do when people are not engaged in determining right from wrong or truth from lies. People who express an opinion without supporting argument are likely simply repeating what has been placed in their minds by others.

Our understanding of what constitutes a good, “standard” education is a case in point. Since we have had little outside the secular school model presented, advanced, normalized and experienced for several generations, “doing” school has become a fixed element of our collective educational world view, by default. In fact, even though the secular version of education is based on the non-existence of God, those professing a Christian faith in God are still far more likely to advance it or blend it with their faith than to search and follow the directives given in the scripture. Lacking biblical understanding of what constitutes a God directed approach to the training and teaching of children, we default to employing familiar secular educational philosophies creating a rather confused mix of ideas called “Christian Education”. This is true even of home educators, although the likelihood of having a better understanding of the issues is greater for those who are not unquestioningly involved in public education.

To exploit a world view, one simply has to agree with the people, whether their world view is based on truth or lies, developed or directed. Understanding that it is far more difficult to change a world view than to rectify it when in error, manipulators and exploiters will agree with people’s faulty understanding and say or do whatever “seems right” in the eyes of the “potential client”, clearly motivated by self-interest.

Any world view that is ignored and/or exploited will naturally self-perpetuate and normalize. When a particular world view is carefully advanced, it should go without saying that alternatives will be stigmatized as radical. When directing and/or exploiting a faulty world view, people do not “come to” but are “provided with” a knowledge of the “truth” or what an outside agency wants them to believe is true. Basing our world view development on anything less than a sincere desire to come to the knowledge of the truth will only lead us to error in a corrupted world view and result in bad judgments and decisions respecting our lives and those we in turn influence.

Part of the series Hangups
Written by Léo Gaumont, published on 2015-11-02.

Understanding world view helps us understand why we do the things we do.

We are generally all ignorant of what is actually happening around us. This ignorance can either be perpetuated and capitalized upon or fixed to empower the masses. It is time to enlighten home educators who have generally been kept in the dark respecting what is occurring within their community. (Ephesians 4: 11-16)

We are all the product of two things: a combination of our genetic makeup (what we inherited through our parents) and the accumulation of all that we have been exposed to in the environment of our lives. The physical attributes (genetics) of our existence is what it is. Although we can and do make modifications to our genetic makeup (with makeup, for instance!) we cannot “change our stripes” so to speak. However, we are born with an astounding ability to learn.

The ability to learn is part of everyone’s makeup, and comes as naturally as sneezing, coughing or scratching when it itches. Granted, different people have differing abilities, ways and approaches to learning, but all human beings learn. We are all “super computers” recording everything we experience in life, whether or not we are aware of it. This is why children are born to parents (not institutions) because only parents (usually) care enough to provide children with as positive a learning environment as possible, knowing that whatever a child is exposed to will become part of who they are and how they see the world. The term describing this is world view.

There are three main “laws” that define world view:

First, everyone has a world view regardless of who they are or where they live. This world view is the processed (passive or active thinking) result of the accumulation of every single experience one has in life, from birth. Generally speaking, whether we believe or disbelieve; understand or lack understanding; know it or not, all world views are based on the premise of the existence or nonexistence of God. People having a shared world view brought about by their collective belief about God, are usually associated with a religious grouping, even when religion affiliation is denied.

Due to the fact that we live in an imperfect (sinful) world, everybody has accumulated bad information, regardless of what has been learned. Therefore, the second “law” is that everybody’s world view is corrupted with misinformation, lies and errors.

The third “law” of world view is based in the age old problem of seeing ourselves as the center of the universe and the corresponding attitude of having to be right. This “law” is based on a natural tendency to defend ourselves. When avoiding a collision or injury, this natural reflex is good, but when it used to defend our “position” regardless of validity, it becomes a handicap to learning and worse still, the underlying reason for every skirmish and dispute, whether it is Muslims vs. Christians; Palestine vs. Israel; left vs. right or Fred vs. Tom.

Everything we say, do and think; all of our fears, aspirations, traditions, religions, faith and so on, is built upon or associated with our world view. Indeed, every decision we make is based on the foundation of our world view, our assumed knowledge of truth, even when this knowledge is faulty. It is important to understand that our world view either directs us to seek or to assume the truth. It is also important to understand that as adults, we do have some control over what we allow to become part of our world view or our children’s.

Part of the series Inspiration From Facilitation
Written by Léo & Faye Gaumont, published on 2013-11-25.

The truth can only set us free if we know it. When we are familiar with it, we are free from the lies that would lead us away from faith in God.

Opinions expressed in this blog are those of the blogger which, although based on personal experience and knowledge of the scriptures, can be in error. No one has a corner on the truth but we should all sincerely be in search of it.

Three foundational Statements:
God is God. There is no other God.
Jesus is Lord.
Truth is absolute.

Three statements that cannot be challenged, if we accept the Bible as true. Now if we use something else as our gauge of truth, such as feeling, opinion, science or philosophy, then the entire structure upon which these three statements are made collapses. If that be the case, we are clearly against God rather than for Him, and therefore:

There are many gods made of all kinds of materials and human imaginations so that all religions are equal and…
Jesus becomes a historical figure, maybe, and is not Lord at all. Therefore…
Truth becomes relative.

The first three statements form the foundation of a biblical worldview. The second three statements discredits the biblical worldview in order to put man in control rather than God which forms the foundation for a secular worldview. Under the guise of being non-religious or non-spiritual, the secular worldview is advanced as neutral. However, since the scripture is clear that we are either for God or against Him, it should be obvious that a neutral position is not possible. The secular worldview is therefore an alternate spiritual perspective that is defended with as much, if not not more, religious fervour as any other faith system.

Every religious system has its opposing worldview. Islam sees non-muslims as infidels. Judaism sees non-jews as gentiles. Biblical Christianity sees those opposing the faith as secular humanists.

Secular humanist deny the existence of God and so see man as the ultimate “creation” of nature through evolution. In this faith man replaces God, science trumps the Bible and all that the world has to offer is for man and by man.

Many of our families have expressed a desire to understand what secular humanism is, how it can be identified, and how one can protect themselves from its erroneous teachings. The answer is the same as what has been offered before. Desire to know the truth. Seriously seek it. Read your Bible with the express purpose of finding it. Secular humanist have done all that is possible to discourage you from doing so because the truth within it will reveal the lies being advanced by them.

Part of the series What is Being Communicated?
Written by Léo Gaumont, published on 2013-09-23.

Sometimes a slogan is so good we dare not question it. But does it actually advance what we think it says?

Opinions expressed in this blog are those of the blogger which, although based on personal experience and knowledge of the scriptures, can be in error. No one has a corner on the truth but we should all sincerely be in search of it.

While on a walk, my wife and I spotted a school sign that got our attention. All it said was “Our Children”. At first brush, this wouldn’t cause much concern for most people as it appears like a collective concern for the educational plight of children in general. However, the LED sign on the school wall provided us with a bit clearer picture. It read “Our Children, Our Future”. Once again, without really thinking about this statement, it has the appearance of nobility, of being concerned for the future, until, that is , we start asking a few questions. If the sign had said “Children: Their Future, Our Future”, it would communicate to me that if we took care of the children, they will take care of us, but that is not what I got from “Our Children, Our Future”. I saw this more as a directive that communicated that if we want to shape the future, we had better shape our children. There is definitely truth to this, but the result will depend on what our presupposition about the future is. Define the future and you have an idea of who these children are and what we have to do to get them to it. If our desire is to have a nation where God is upheld in the highest authority and followed in obedience, we would be directing our children differently than if we wanted a nation where man is central, the determiner of values and maker of rules. For a Godly future, would we not teach them values and precepts as outlined in the Bible? If preparing them for service or conformity to a Godless society, would we use the same resources? Different objectives founded on different values depend entirely on our presuppositions. Believing in God, the authority of His Word and His purpose in creation, or not, will most certainly direct those teaching the children to instill in them different knowledge and values. “Our Children, Our Future” should beg us to question what future “our” children are being prepared for in that school. Our children indeed are our future and we do have a choice on how to prepare them for it. However, we would be wise if we prepared them for one that ultimately extends beyond this life. This future is far too important to entrust to perfect strangers in an institution that may not have the same ideas of what the future should look like or what the children need to learn to get there.